My first reading of Tolstoy affected me as a revelation from heaven, as the trumpet of the judgment. What he made me feel was notthe desire to imitate, but the conviction that imitation was futile.

... beauty, like ecstasy, has always been hostile to the commonplace. And the commonplace, under its popular label of the normal,has been the supreme authority for Homo sapiens since the days when he was probably arboreal.

The only difference between a rut and a grave are the dimensions.

Cynicism is a sure sign of youth.

marriage is mostly puttin' up with things, I reckon, when it ain't makin' believe.

Insolent youth rides, now, in the whirlwind. For those modern iconoclasts who are without culture possess, apparently, all the courage.

Moderation has never yet engineered an explosion